


can you see this opposition comes rising up sometimes, that it's dreadful imposition comes blacking in my mind

by staubfingers



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, Kissing It Better, M/M, Non-Graphic Smut, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-07-23
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:54:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,060
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25471987
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/staubfingers/pseuds/staubfingers
Summary: Dying is easy, watching your partner die isn't, and Nicky doesn't know how long he'll be able to cope.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 16
Kudos: 290





	can you see this opposition comes rising up sometimes, that it's dreadful imposition comes blacking in my mind

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still not over the fact that this is an action movie with a gay couple that kissed on screen!  
> Title is from _I See A Darkness_ by _Johnny Cash_ (but _Nothern Lite_ 's version is better imo), and beware, English is not my first language.

Dying is easy. It requires neither strength nor bravery, it doesn't hurt nor does it scare you, it merely happens. Ultimately, every living being is created for its decease, even the ones who refuse to stay dead. Thus, the soul lets go of the body when it realizes there is no point in holding on to it any longer, and that last moment brings relief, brings liberation from the pain.

Watching someone you love die, on the other hand, is anything but. Witnessing the light leaving their eyes, hearing them taking their last breath, is the worst torture imaginable and not even a millennia is enough to take a fraction of the horrors accompanying it away.

Nicky remembers the first time, remembers how he felt his own heart stop beating and how he saw Joe's body collapse. In the split of a second it took his brain to shut down completely he began to panic, to internally scream that this _could not be_. Only years later he would understand that he wasn't scared for himself but for Joe, a part of his mind identifying this man, this _enemy,_ as what he truly was; his soulmate.

They came back to life together, confused and terrified, and thrust their swords into the other's body before either of them could grasp what has happened. It went on like that; they killed, and they died, and they came back, and with every repetition Nicky grew more desperate. After hours, or days, they were clawing at each other, bloody and naked, clothing and weapons long destroyed, but their bodies refused to give in. He doesn't remember who kissed whom first, maybe they decided it together, just like they decided to not let go of the other even though they weren't able to kill him. It felt more intense than the steel piercing his skin ever did, and when he came, their sperm mixing with their blood, hot and _alive_ , Nicky was sure that this was what would force his body to stay dead, that he'd implode with the feeling of _wholeness_. Of course, his life only began then.

Over the centuries he watched Joe die countless of times and every one of those instances scared him that this was the day fate eventually ruled them apart, leaving him behind to suffer for an eternity.

“I'm here,” Joe says whenever he takes his first breath, eyes opening immediately to get a glimpse at Nicky, to make sure he's okay, just as Nicky does when it's him who has died again.

And normally it's enough to ease their minds, to allow them to focus on the situation they're in and how they'll get out of it, so that they can fall into the other's arms, to hold each other close until the pain leaves them.

In the wake of being abducted by Merrick, of Booker's betrayal, and Andy losing her immortality, it isn't enough, though, and it's only when they find themselves in a safe house far away from London that Nicky dares to let his body and mind relax. At least he tries to.

“Everything will be alright,” Andy promises, sad smile on her lips, and he never felt so helpless.

“I can't watch her go. We can't let it happen, we need to find a way to fix this,” he tells Joe later that night when they're lying in bed, faces inches apart, legs tangled and finger interwind. If Andy dies, if she dies and stays dead, it's only a matter of time until it happens to them, to _Joe,_ and the pain this thought alone causes him is nearly unbearable.

“We will. No matter what it'll take, where we'll have to go and what we'll have to do, we'll save her.” Joe's grip on his hands tightens, in affirmation and in fear equally as Nicky can see in his eyes.

“I'm scared,” he admits and gets closer, lets his lips brush over Joe's, “There is no world without you.”

Joe kisses him, short and yet longingly, and whispers into Nicky's mouth, “And there is no world without you.”

Only when he tastes salt on Joe's lips Nicky realizes that he started crying, the tears he successfully held back ever since they were strapped down in the laboratory, eventually coming to the surface after all.

“I'm here,” Joe says and frees his hands to place them on Nicky's face and stroke his cheeks with his thumbs. He always does this whenever he tries to calm Nicky down, to bring him back from the dark place his mind has taken him to. Sometimes he traces the small lines on Nicky's face and makes up stories to where he got them from. “I remember this one,” he will say as if Nicky doesn't look exactly like he did the day they met, a millennia ago, “We were on a ship, crossing the Atlantic for the first time. You were sick day and night, and your stomach only got used to it a few hours before we reached our destination. You were so angry that you left the ship with this line on your forehead.”

They make Nicky laugh, bring him back to the here and now, but this time a little story doesn't seem to be enough and Joe probably feels the same, for that he uses his mouth to place feather-light kisses on every patch of Nicky's skin he can reach.

“If it weren't for Nile, if we hadn't reach out to her, or if we had decided to do it any later, we would still be there,” Nicky says, the desperation he felt in those few days threatening to take hold of him once again.

“But we are _not_ there. We're safe and we're together.” With those words Joe lies down on his back, pulls Nicky with him and he automatically places his head on Joe's chest. He hears Joe's heart beating steadily and strongly against his ribs and Nicky claws his hand into the shirt that is separating him from Joe's skin, wants him to take it off while being unable to let go of him for even a second.

“They would have put us into different cells, eventually. They would have experimented on us and I wouldn't have been there for you. They hurt you and there was nothing I could do about it.” The tears are falling rapidly from his eyes, leaving a wet spot on the fabric beneath his face. Joe's hands are on his back and in his hair, painting slow circles while holding him in place.

“Even if it came to it, we would have found a way out, we always do. There has been nothing and no one that could keep me away from you in one thousand years, and there won't be for another millennia.” Joe's voice is so full of conviction that Nicky nearly dares to believe him.

“There will be others who'll try to force us apart, to use us,” Nicky whispers and props his head up to look into Joe's eyes, wants to get lost in them, to never look at anything but this beautiful face, “We need to be prepared.”

“We will be,” Joe affirms, “Let them come. Anyone who dares to touch you will die by my hand.”

“Everyone will run in fear of our wrath, I won't rest until every single person who did you harm has died.”

Joe begins to grin at those words, puts his hands back on Nicky's face and pulls him up to his' so that their lips brush while he speaks, “You can be terrifying, my love.”

“They deserve more than terror for hurting you,” Nicky says, but his words get lost in their kiss.

The way their tongues seek each other out is full of desperation, and the moan that slips from Joe's lips sends a shiver down both their spines.

“I need you,” Nicky groans, “I need you, I need you.”

Joe doesn't waste any time, rolls them over and pulls his own shirt over his head and has his mouth on Nicky's neck before he's able to do the same. One thousand years and not a day went by that he didn't desire the man he once tried to kill. He heard all those stories about people falling out of love, of being _tired_ of their partner after a decade or two, and the only explanation Nicky has for this is that they simply aren't made for each other like Joe and him are.

Where Joe's hands slipped under his shirt he feels his skin burn, every single of those touches making him crave for more. “Let me,” he mumbles, and fumbles with his own shirt. Joe understands like he always does, sits up and pulls the fabric over Nicky's head and lies back down, a press of skin against skin.

They're kissing and rutting against each other, getting harder and harder with every passing second, and Nicky wants to be hold, to be loved, all the while getting feral with the need to _come apart_.

After finally having shed the remainders of their clothing, Nicky rolls them back over, enjoys the grin that immediately spreads on Joe's face, and sinks down on him without any preparation. It hurts, so much that he nearly stops, but in the next moment the skin has knitted itself back together and he takes the last few centimetres until Joe is settled fully inside of him.

He looks concerned, and Nicky only smiles and leans down, kisses him until the lines of worry disappear from Joe's face, and then he starts to move. It's uncomfortable and it somehow seems only fitting, however, Joe still sits up when Nicky winces unwillingly and slings his arms around him, holding him down.

“I love you,” he whispers against the skin of Nicky's neck.

There is another tear in the corner of his eye and it spills over when Joe says it again, “ _I love you_ .” He hooks his legs around Joe's waist and claws his hands into Joe's shoulders, and starts to move again, painfully slow. The position doesn't allow a faster pace, and while Nicky nearly grows mad with it, it's _perfect._

They orgasm together, and for those few, precious seconds Nicky doesn't know where he ends and Joe begins, they're one. When their breathing almost calmed they lie back down, still joined and refusing to let go of each other.

“Do you feel better?” Joe asks after a while.

“Yes,” Nicky answers, not sure if it's true.

From where his head is resting on Joe's chest he isn't able to see his face, but he hears the smile in his voice nonetheless, “Don't lie.”

Nicky wants to say that he's uncertain whether he can bear to see Joe die one more time, not only for those agonizing seconds of terror when he's uncertain whether Joe'll come back to him, but because every time Joe's heart stops beating it's like he takes a piece of Nicky with him to where-ever they go to then. A thousands years of watching his other half die has taken it's toll on him, and Nicky has never been so aware of it as in this moment, exhausted from the horrors of the past few days and the realization that the life they've led for the last two centuries has irrevocably changed. He doesn't speak any of those words, though, merely closes his eyes and tries to let Joe's even breathing lull him to sleep.

“Every time I watch you die,” Joe whispers when Nicky nearly has drifted off, “I promise myself that it was the last time I let it happen, and every time I fail you.”

“No,” Nicky says, immediately fully awake, “You could never fail me.” When he sits up slightly and turns his head, he sees the same tears in Joe's eyes that spilled from his own only minutes ago, tears of desperation and fear. “You never have, and you never will.”

Joe doesn't say anything else to this, only pulls Nicky in for a kiss.

Dying is easy, so easy actually that Nicky would do it all over again just to spent a few more minutes in Joe's arms, to be surrounded by his love. It's just as reassuring as it is terrifying that Joe would do the same.


End file.
